


fire girl

by liamneeson



Category: Avatar: Legend of Korra
Genre: Canon Universe, Character Study, Gen, its kinda......angstY, just random headcanons abt her past??
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-20
Updated: 2018-07-20
Packaged: 2019-06-13 11:37:59
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 982
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15363807
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/liamneeson/pseuds/liamneeson
Summary: She is six when she watches her mother killed in the fire that she has to unlearn her fear for.





	fire girl

**Author's Note:**

> This is so old, I'm almost embarrassed to be looking at it. I think I wrote this back in 2014, or when Book 2 ended. I honestly cringe at my old writing so I'm hilariously insecure about this. But lately I've been missing Miss Asami, so here I am. 
> 
> It's kind of a collection of warped headcanon things? Just kooky speculation about her past and then some. It's probably a reach but whatever.

> ****_**first — a tremble** _

She is six when she watches her mother killed in the fire that she has to unlearn her fear for.

Death makes you forget many things. Asami Sato will find out that it doesn’t even take months for her to forget how her mother looked like smiling (her father as well). Easily, her mother's voice stops being a tone she remembers until it becomes words that she reads in her mind; mechanic. The scent of freesia soon dies down because Hiroshi dislikes them now; it becomes a taboo so even the servants are careful. Her touch might as well have been nonexistent and in fact, it isn't until a while that any one picks her up at all. She is not even seven when she struggles to remember what her mother looked like, only bought back when she finds a rare photo hidden in the folds of his father's many maps in the common room and the woman she is beginning to forget is staring back at her.

Hiroshi sees it, and the photograph is quick to disappear in the hearth.   
  
_(Would you look at that. Mom always disappears in flames!)_

Some days, she hides. No one can tell when she will choose to do so until the servants can't find her and her father is sick with worry.

Ever since her mother died, the big house frightens Asami. Home is now cold and open and quiet. There are no happy trills down the hall, no upbeat melody sneaking into her room, no warm hugs, no family meals. The joy of home burned down when her mother's corpse did, infiltrating her olfactory with acrid smoke and crippling misery.

When it is late, Asami comes out of her hiding place and life resumes.

Nothing less is expected from her.

> _**second — a storm** _

Pubescence is filled with lover after lover.

She is rich with no real duty in the world and her life is painted in shades of loneliness. It is no wonder she craves love and affection, no matter how hollow or warped. Girls and boys alike stroll into Asami's heart in an orderly queue, stealing piece by piece of her and leaving her less intact than the last one did. They ruin her slowly, in a crawling pace (although some are quick and merciless about it, hacking off a chunk of her love and running away) and their frequent poison are barbed words, blatant neglect and insults that jar.

Everybody leaves. Before she can tell, before its too late, everyone is making that slow walk away from her. She is fine with this, she thinks. She never makes anyone stay.

Over time, she develops a numbness to this, only awakened from her protective shell when there are lips against her skin, fingers inside of her or someone pumping into her. She isn't even eighteen yet, and she's already gone.

She is pathetic. This she understands.

To the world (to the people who don't matter) Asami is a diamond: beautiful, desirable, untarnished and strong. They do not see the girl struggling to put the pieces back together every morning when she rolls out of bed. They do not know, and she prefers it that way.

> _**third — a reckoning** _

At some point, when the last one (firebender, amber eyes, walls impenetrable) she will ever allow breaks her heart, she decides to put an end to this kind of life. In her new mindset, it is easy to kick her own ass. Brainwashing herself to be this different, ivory girl is a good decision. Suddenly, she doesn't need lovers to feel whole. She doesn't need someone to mold herself for, so she develops a backbone and her own personality shines.

> _**fourth — a drought** _

Sometimes Asami sees flames roll over her skin or erupt from her fingers. It is anger, it is rage, it is heartbreak, it is lust. She is hailed from firebenders, from war and devastation. The fire is allowed to stem, but is nipped at the bud because that is what’s safe, that is what’s right.

Asami thinks: she cannot let herself get sucked into the hatred that consumed her father. She cannot buy into this turmoil that ruins lives and perspectives because her mother had inspired her to build a life unmarred and untethered. She will do that in honor of her mama's memory.

From the witness stand, she stares unflinchingly at her father, willing the vestiges of love to ebb away into resentment, because that is easier, that is sane. She testifies against him because bad men deserve justice. When he is sentenced to life imprisonment without bail, she breathes a sigh of relief. When she ambles home tipsy, she finally cries. Her father is lost, but she is free now. Days are spent elbow deep in work, trying to salvage a failing industry and a tarnished name. She signs deals, mergers, anything to save the business. When she looks down at the ends of the contracts where her signature curves and flourishes, she sees red. She wants to rip his last name from hers, because it is  _his_ , it is disgusting, it is the embodiment of everything she detests. Hiroshi Sato tried to kill her. This is something she will never forget or forgive.

> _**fifth — a reprieve** _

Time may not heal all wounds, but Asami is better. She doesn't fall asleep crying and she wakes up with a clear head and a plan. Her smile is easier, not forced. She ties her hair back because it gets in the way and vanity becomes unimportant. Her life now revolves around healthier things. She might have no family, but she has friends now who easily fill that void in her chest. Work is no longer a desperate obligation, but a sense of pride. Twenty-one years old and she's a millionaire and not an alcoholic.

Things have finally gone right.

**Author's Note:**

> i'm mirajens on tumblr and @m1rajens on twit if u wanna talk to me about how asami sato taught all of us idiots how to dodge a lawsuit by flirting with the guy we hit with our transportation vehicles!!!!


End file.
